Born in Haarlem, Paulus Cornelisz van Beresteyn became an extremely wealthy merchant in Delft, and Lord of Overschie. In 1574 he married Volckera Claesdr Knobbert, the daughter of a Delft brewer, Claes Adriaensz Knobbert, and Maria Duyst. In 1596, Van Beresteyn became a member of the Council of Forty, the most important political organization in Delft, and subsequently held a number of civic posts: alderman (1597), burgomaster (1601), regent of the Orphan Chamber (1609) and municipal treasurer (1615). Van Beresteyn also served as delegate to the States of Holland (1602) and the States-General.3 The Rijksmuseum pendants (see SK-A-909 and the portrait shown here) are just two of a number of bust-length workshop replicas of Van Mierevelt’s portraits of Paulus Cornelisz van Beresteyn and Volckera Claesdr Knobbert in Kasteel De Keukenhof, Lisse. Dated 1612, the prototype for Van Beresteyn’s portrait shows him standing at three-quarter length and is inscribed ‘64’, his age in that year (fig. a).4 The pendant of Volckera Claesdr Knobbert to this 1612 portrait of Van Beresteyn (fig. b) is itself, perhaps, a replica, as it is dated 1618, while the bust-length replicas, including the one in the Rijksmuseum, bear earlier dates. Another possibility is that the date was added later.5 The 1618 painting shows Volckera Knobbert seated and at three-quarter length, and if not itself Van Mierevelt’s original portrait, is probably an exact replica of it. The dendrochronology of the Rijksmuseum’s Portrait of Paulus Cornelisz van Beresteyn indicates that it was executed in or after 1617. The Rijksmuseum pair was probably owned by the sitters’ daughter, Caecilia van Beresteyn, and passed by inheritance to Jonkheer Jacob de Witte van Citters (1817-76). The numbers 24 and 25 painted on the backs of the panels correspond to the ground plan of the library of Kasteel Popkensburg drawn up in the early 19th century, which was owned by the De Witte van Citters family. Jonathan Bikker, 2007 See Bibliography and Rijksmuseum painting catalogues See Key to abbreviations and Acknowledgements This entry was published in J. Bikker (ed.), Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century in the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, I: Artists Born between 1570 and 1600, coll. cat. Amsterdam 2007, no. 194.